Insurance companies are showing “a profound lack of preparedness” for climate change, with only 3% of the 330 firms in an industry survey receiving lead ranking in a Ceres report this week.
The highest-scoring insurers—including Munich Re, Swiss Re, and Prudential—“ were those that have adopted a broad range of climate-conscious products and services, such as rate pricing plans that account for potential climate impacts like storms and fires,” Mother Jones reports. “Some insurers are also investing in high-end climate modeling software to better understand where their risks really are.”
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But many insurers are adjusting by simply refusing to insure properties in threatened areas. “As a regulator, it’s very bad to see markets being abandoned because of the threat that exists,” said Washington State Insurance Commissioner Mike Kreidler, one of the report’s lead authors.
Insurance Information Institute President Robert Hartwig took issue with the report, stating that “the property/casualty industry and the reinsurance industry are and have been at the vanguard of managing climate-related risks for decades, and in some cases centuries.”
